Disagreements and comments

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Rian van der Merwe on taking comments off his site:

Oh, comments. I’ve gone back and forth on this so many times. Sometimes I leave comments open, other times I close them. Sometimes I close comments on a post, get called out on Twitter about it, and then open it up again. It’s confusing and it’s causing me headaches. So I’ve made a decision to close comments on all posts, at least for a month or so, or until someone writes a convincing argument on why sites should have comments.

I’ve gone back and forth on this many times, but I must admit sometimes it doesn’t seem worth it to keep the comments on. Ten years ago comments were a way for the readers to express their opinion on a story — for many that was the only avenue they had to interact with the author.

That’s not the case anymore. You have Twitter, easily accessible email addresses and of course many people have their own blogs to write out their thoughts.

Instashuffle [Sponsor]

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Instashuffle is a way to browse Instagram in an endless image stream. And it is now free. On the App Store for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad with iOS 5 and later.

GoDaddy accused of thwarting domain transfers

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Jason Snell for Macworld:

In a post on its blog, fellow domain registrar Namecheap reports that customers trying to transfer their domains away from GoDaddy are being delayed. The post accuses GoDaddy of “returning incomplete WHOIS information” as a part of the transfer process, a practice which is against the rules of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), the process manager for the domain-name system.

I transferred a domain from GoDaddy last week and it went just fine. However, after losing more than 72,000 in five days, things may have changed.

Esquire interviews Slash

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A couple of quotes from the interview:

Guitars are like women. You’ll never get them totally right.When I see footage of Guns N’ Roses, I see that fucking hunger and attitude. You could not fuck with those five guys. It was just raw. It was this lean, hungry thing on its way up. It was as sincere as any rock ‘n’ roll that I’ve ever heard, and I’m proud of that.

I’ve interviewed Slash a number of times and he’s a great guy.

Apple’s iOS vs. all Android phones this quarter

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Matt Richman:

Using those numbers, Apple will sell 59.38 million iOS devices, slightly less than devices running Android. But, if Apple does report “the largest blowout in company history”, then Apple will outsell every Android vendor combined.

Well that settles it, Android is winning.

CleanMyMac

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Thanks to CleanMyMac for sponsoring The Loop during Christmas week.

GoDaddy loses 72,354 domains in five days

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TNW:

It looks like these PR moves to save face, and business, are completely futile. According to TheDomains, 21,054 domains were transferred away from Go Daddy on Friday alone. At $6.99 a pop, that would make for a loss of $147,167, not taking future renewals into account.

I started transferring my domains just before Christmas.

Biogrify beta testers wanted

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Create a fun visual snapshot of your life. Life is not a static bio; it’s an evolving story.

Biogrify is a new web app where you can create an interactive infographic about your life. I have to say, this looks really interesting. You can sign-up to beta test — no guarantees you’ll get accepted.

RIM faces legal challenge over ‘BBM’

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Reuters: Research In Motion, still smarting over having to change the name of its yet-to-come operating system, faces a similar trademark challenge to its popular instant-messaging service BlackBerry Messenger. Because things are going so well for RIM, they just needed … Continued

Go Daddy No Longer Supports SOPA

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Go Daddy is no longer supporting SOPA, the “Stop Online Piracy Act” currently working its way through U.S. Congress.“Fighting online piracy is of the utmost importance, which is why Go Daddy has been working to help craft revisions to this legislation – but we can clearly do better,” Warren Adelman, Go Daddy’s newly appointed CEO, said. “It’s very important that all Internet stakeholders work together on this. Getting it right is worth the wait. Go Daddy will support it when and if the Internet community supports it.”

Win.

The same, but different

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Matt Alexander:

Rather than building the best device for the user, manufacturers are intent on differentiating themselves from increasingly similar products. Absurd product names, enormous screens, and LTE connections cannot, and will not, disguise the fact that all of these devices are running the same operating system and have largely similar internals.

BOOM!

BlackBerry 10 doesn’t have email, BBM

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BGR:

In what is something of a serious allegation, our source told us that Mike Lazaridis was lying when he said the company’s new lineup was delayed for that reason. ”RIM is simply pushing this out as long as they can for one reason, they don’t have a working product yet,” we were told.

Of course RIM has denied what BGR’s source said. But then again, I don’t believe much of what RIM says these days.

They also said the PlayBook would deliver an amazing tablet experience. Amazingly bad.

New pro audio magazine available for iOS Newsstand

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MPVHub Magazine features the latest in music software tutorials, gear reviews, industry news, interviews with audio experts, and more. It’s where music makers come to learn, with the experts, by the experts.MPVHub Audio features over 100 pages of content in each issue. Featuring the largest selection of Audio DAW tutorials available in any magazine, each issue has at least 20 different tutorials for Logic Pro, Pro Tools, Reason, Live, Cubase, Native Instruments, & Spectrasonics software.

The first issue was available for $0.99. I bought it.

MacTech expands to 15 events across the US in 2012

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MacTech Magazine announced today a massive event line up for 2012. Where in 2010, MacTech did a single event, and in 2011, MacTech produced seven events; in 2012, MacTech will hold FIFTEEN events spanning the country. MacTech’s event line up includes a combination of well received MacTech Boot Camps for small-to-medium sized business consultants, its new MacTech InDepth series for deep dives on single topics, and its heralded three day MacTech Conference for IT Pros and Developers.

Nice to see MacTech expanding again next year. The Loop has once again signed on as a sponsor of these events for 2012.

Steven Slate Drums 4.0

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Steven Slate:

Imagine having 100 of the world’s best sounding drumkits at your disposal. From punchy tight rock kits, to fat and sizzly vintage kits, and just about everything in between, Steven Slate Drums 4.0 Platinum is the most complete drum instrument on the planet.At the heart of Steven Slate Drums 4.0 is the SSD Player, a state of the art Mac/PC (VST, RTAS, AU) Drum Sampler built from the ground up by the award winning development team behind our TRIGGER drum replacement processor. The SSD Player is extremely easy and intuitive to use. Loading kits, customizing kits, mixing kits, loading and auditioning MIDI grooves, customizing MIDI maps, and routing discretely to your workstation are all a breeze with the SSD Player. It even lets you load your own drum samples to mix in with the Slate drumkits.

I have used Steven Slate Drums since they were first released and love them. One of the best drum samplers on the market. I’ll definitely be upgrading.

Solution for a stolen iPhone and iMessage

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Lex Friedman discovers a solution for a problem discovered by Ars earlier this week that would allow iMessages to be sent to your iPhone even after it had been wiped:

Macworld can confirm that perhaps the easiest way to ensure that a stolen phone stops receiving iMessages is to remotely wipe the phone, and then call your carrier and instruct them to deactivate your old SIM. The third and final step? Activate a new SIM in your new phone.Completing those three steps—wiping, deactivating your old SIM, and then activating a new one—ensures that your iMessages will get sent only to you and your iOS devices, and not anywhere else.

iPad gets 83% satisfaction rating

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A new study from the Software Usability Research Laboratory (SURL) shows that Apple’s iPad continues to satisfy its customers.

Steve Jobs awarded a Grammy

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As former CEO and co-founder of Apple, Steve Jobs helped create products and technology that transformed the way we consume music, TV, movies, and books. A creative visionary, Jobs’ innovations such as the iPod and its counterpart, the online iTunes store, revolutionized the industry and how music was distributed and purchased. In 2002 Apple Computer Inc. was a recipient of a Technical GRAMMY Award for contributions of outstanding technical significance to the recording field. The company continues to lead the way with new technology and in-demand products such as the iPhone and iPad.

Very nice.

How Gradient for Mac was built

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Nicola Armellini:

Retracing the steps you’ve taken is a helpful way to understand how well you’ve executed your vision – whatever that might be. What could you have done better? What should have been avoided? Today, I’ll share what we’ve learned (and are still learning) while crafting Gradient. It’s an experience that has changed everything for us.

Apple removes 180-day deadline for Complete my Album

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Mac Rumors:

Until now, users have generally had a window of 180 days from the date of their first individual track purchase from a given album within which they could upgrade at the discounted rate using the Complete My Album program… But the updated support document posted by Apple today reveals a different answer, and it now appears that the 180-day deadline has been removed entirely.

More great iTunes news today.

AppDesigner: An app maker for non-coders

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A friend of mine called me today and asked about an app to help him make an app. I recommended AppDesigner, a Mac app made by a good friend of mine. He was so impressed with the app, I figured I’d mention it in case anyone else is looking for a way to make an iPhone app.

Volcanic activity in 2011

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The Atlantic:

Out of an estimated 1,500 active volcanoes around the world, 50 or so erupt every year, spewing steam, ash, toxic gases, and lava. In 2011, active volcanoes included Chile’s Puyehue, Japan’s Shinmoedake, Indonesia’s Lokon, Iceland’s Grímsvötn, Italy’s Etna, and recently Nyamulagira in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In Hawaii, Kilauea continues to send lava flowing toward the sea, and the ocean floor has been erupting near the Canary Islands. Collected below are scenes from the wide variety of volcanic activity on Earth over the past year

These pictures are just stunning.